User talk:SpartHawg948
User:SpartHawg948/archive1 User:SpartHawg948/archive2 User:SpartHawg948/archive3 Quck Note Just archived all the prior content. If you need to leave a comment related to something that is now archived, I'd appreciate it if you do so here, as opposed to in the archive. With that having been said, I do understand that there are situations where it would be easier/more convenient to continue on a pre-existing thread that is now in the archive, and if that is the case, then I'll understand. My asking that things be put here whenever possible isn't a demand or an order, just a humble request. Thank you much, people! :) SpartHawg948 11:02, June 5, 2010 (UTC) :In case you find it useful: --DRY 01:14, June 10, 2010 (UTC) I just may do that actually. Make it look a little more professional, a little more like I know what I'm doing! :) SpartHawg948 01:40, June 10, 2010 (UTC) :Mind if I steal that idea as well? Lancer1289 02:04, June 10, 2010 (UTC) If you're asking me, then yes, I do mind, dammit! :P No, I don't mind in the slightest. If you're asking DRY, well, it's my user page, so he doesn't object either! :P SpartHawg948 02:07, June 10, 2010 (UTC) *Nice re-wording of the Terra Nova Enterprise trivia bit, btw. Much more informative now, as well as relevant. SpartHawg948 02:08, June 10, 2010 (UTC) :Thanks for that. Also I like reading your responses to things like what I asked, they always make me laugh. Lancer1289 02:11, June 10, 2010 (UTC) Collector Cruiser On the discussion page of the Collector Cruiser you claim that there is nothing to suggest that there was only one cruiser, I must contend that this is false. First, the same ship is encountered three times in a row by Shepard and company, as Shepard himself says "more than just coincidence." Second, the cruiser contained millions, possibly tens of millions of pods, enough to supply all the Humans needed to build the Human-reaper; methodical and efficient as they are, why would the reapers waste resources building several such ships when one is more than sufficient. One could argue that having several ships is more efficient; but if the reapers had used this logic, they would have made each vessel much smaller, frigate sized maybe or genuinely cruiser sized, but the Collector "cruiser" is the size of a small dreadnought for Christsake, and the label 'cruiser' is only used twice, both times tentatively and both times at the very beginning of the game, thereafter it is known simply as a 'ship'. But back to the number of Collector vessels; the average human colony has a population of less than a thousand. The reapers would know this from monitoring of the extranet (pop. statistics are hardly classified information) and would have two strategies to choose from: send many small Collector ships to attack one colony each and return to base every time; or send one enormous vessel to gather as many as it can find in one sweep and then return to base. The advantage of the second strategy is that fewer round trips are required per sweep as well as fewer ships; a larger ship can defend itself more easily if discovered and will commit fewer attacks in one go. The advantage to this leads me to my third point, discretion. With many vessels commiting multiple attacks, there would be a noticeable increase in the number of colony attacks and something that the galactic powers would have to take note of; one ship can commit attacks and the disparity of such incidences would pass unnoticed through the statistics. One could argue that several ships makes the job of creating a human-reaper faster, but having been around for millions of years the reapers aren't exactly pressed for time. Also, this vessel(s) would have been around for thousands of years since the collectors were making clandestine deals with the galaxy for centuries before Mass Effect 1; given their exotic and lofty prices, they could hardly need a dozen ships to carry out these transactions. My point is, the controversy of how many ships there were should be noted in the article itself, so far it rather ignorantly assumes that there were many ships, assumptions are worse than speculation but any attempt to add such speculation is always removed. It should at least be mentioned. :Well, let's take a looksee, shall we? The same ship was encountered three times in a row. This is true. That does not mean it's the only Collector Cruiser. It could just be that this particular cruiser was the one assigned to take down Shepard. That seems plausible, doesn't it? Sure does! Next, it contained millions of pods, enough to supply enough humans to build the Human-Reaper. Yes, it did. Eventually. But does it contain enough to deliver the number of humans required all at once? We don't know. Assuming that it did is speculation, as is assuming that the one ship would suffice for the Reapers goals. As to your 'efficiency' argument, it would hardly be efficient to use small, frigate sized vessels to attack colony worlds with the purpose of abducting colonists. As you yourself later point out, such a ship needs to defend itself. Small, frigate sized vessels would stand no chance against the defenses of, say, Earth. Which brings me to another point: How would this one Collector cruiser have taken on Earth, which was, per dialogue, the intended eventual target? The Cruiser couldn't stand up to one heavy frigate! How would it have fared against the Alliance fleet (which likely would have been using dreadnoughts to defend Earth, and likely would have had Citadel reinforcements standing by)? Pretty poorly! You offer a false dilemma with your scenario: It has to be either many small ships making many trips, or one large ship making few trips. It could be mulitple large ships, a combination of large and small ships, and so on and so forth. It's much more complex than the simplistic way you phrase it. You also claim that with more than one large ship attacking colonies, great powers would have taken note. Well, they did! The Alliance took note. Remember Horizon? Where the Alliance sent someone to check out the disappearances? This in addition to Cerberus and a multitude of smaller groups and individuals taking note. Again, it just doesn't make sense to only have one of these ships, especially in light of the fact that they appear to have intended to take on tougher nuts (such as Earth) in the near future, and one cruiser wouldn't suffice for that. Again, there is no evidence in-game that this is the only cruiser, and all you've offered here has been speculation. SpartHawg948 20:37, June 5, 2010 (UTC) ::(edit conflict)Now to this. First we don't know how many ships the Collectors have. We don't know that the same cruiser ecountered by Shepard at the Collector Base is the same as the one that was encoutered the previous times. We don't know and the contriversy, as you put it, is because we dont know. You seem to want to impose your will on the article by saying there is just one, but we don't know so we say that is there currently. Second the mention of millions of pods is pure speculaiton, we don't know, and suggesting a number is speculation. Also in the beginning of the game, the ensign says looks like a cruiser, so we take that as it is about the size of a cruiser. Visual comparisons are not enough to make out the size of something, which is why we don't allow it. THe ensign says cruiser, so we say cruiser. The average human colony having a population of under a thousand, wow where did that come from. Horizon has a population of 654,930, Therum 34,000, Terra Nova 4.4 million, ande Bekenstein 5,425,000. While we don't know the rest of the populations, we can assume that 1,000 for the whole colony is a extrememly underestimated number. You have offered nothing but speculation, which doesn't back up anything you said. Lancer1289 20:46, June 5, 2010 (UTC) It doesn't seem that either of you read a word I said, my desire is NOT to 'impose my will' on this or any other article, my ultimate desire was to have it noted down that it isn't at all clear if more than one vessel existed, its possible but NOT certain as the article implies. I was hoping for some intelligent discourse on the issue but sadly my hopes were misplaced, instead all I get are two hysterical backlashes from two self-righteous pinheads. Please accept my profound apologies if that violates your precious guidelines on insulting other users, but I feel insulted by the patronising and willful hypocrisy of your responses. It is YOU who seek to impose YOUR wills and your stunted 2 dimensional views onto everyone else. Since you have chosen to reply, not with intelligent counter-arguments, but instead by selectively twisting and ignoring my arguments, I'm not going to waste my time pointing out everything that is wrong with your "replies". I can say all this with all due respect, because no respect is actually due, this is turn is because no respect is offered in the first place. :Seriously guy? Seriously? When did I ever state that you were seeking to impose your will on the article? I never did! I stuck to your points, treated them with the full weight and respect they deserved, and answered them. And what do I get in return? I get called a self-righteous pinhead. Real classy, pal. I was doing my best to contribute to the intelligent discourse, but it seems that when confronted with facts, your favored tactic is to launch ad hominem attacks, state that you aren't going to waste your time pointing out what is wrong with my response (a sure sign that you can't find fault with them), and to storm off in a tizzy. If that's how you operate, do it somewhere other than my talk page. If you'd like to have the intelligent discourse you claim to seek, I suggest you actually try responding to the counterpoints presented to your argument, rather than resorting to childish name calling. This isn't the third grade, pal. SpartHawg948 21:24, June 5, 2010 (UTC) *Ok, since apparently no response will be forthcoming, let's take a closer look at this. This is not to be mean, but because I'm not a fan of (among other things) being called a self-righteous pinhead, a hypocrite, patronizing, incapable of intelligent discourse, being told that my factual and on-topic reply is a hysterical backlash, and that rather than replying with intelligent counter-arguments, I have to ignore or selectively twist arguments. So let's break down my response, compare it to the original, and see if it really is a hysterical backlash that relies not on intelligent counter-argument, but instead on distorting and ignoring other users comments. I don't want to omit anything, so I'll begin with the opening irrelevances/niceties: Pretty self-explanatory, that. Next, we see my response to the following argument presented by the anonymous user (referred to subsequently as A for anon, and I'll refer to myself as M for me). A: M: Maybe a little irreverent/flippant on my part, which I suppose could be misconstrued as me being patronizing or condescending, though this was not the intent at all. I next respond to the following- A: M: As you can see, my counter-argument directly addressed the issue, and pointed out that we don't have enough information here to draw any conclusions. Moving on. A: This one was rather lengthy, as was my response. M: Here, I do the following: To counter the efficiency argument, I point out that having multiple large ships makes sense from an efficiency standpoint. Further, we are left to conclude based on dialogue that the Collectors intended to target Earth. If this is in fact the case, it would be sheer madness to attempt to do so with one cruiser described by A as being "the size of a small dreadnought" when the defenses of Earth would most certianly consist of elements of the Alliance Navy to include cruisers and likely carriers and dreadnoughts. One cruiser which couldn't even withstand an attack by a heavy frigate (an advanced frigate, but a frigate nonetheless) couldn't dream of taking on Earth. Next, A makes the following point: To this I reply: Again, maybe a little irreverent, which again could be construed as something other than how I intended it, but the point remains. The discretion argument just doesn't fly. After all, the argument presented to oppose multiple cruisers is that the galactic powers would have taken note of the attacks. And as I pointed out, that is exactly what happened! After all, the Systems Alliance is a galactic power, one of the four Council Races. Next, A makes the following point, which I do appear to have failed to respond to, for which I apologize. A: So let me respond now. We have no idea how "exotic" or lofty the prices of these ships are. Assuming that they are so prohibitively expensive as to preclude the possibility of the Collectors possessing more than one is speculation. It also just doesn't fly to compare prior small-scale deals, with totals of beings numbering in the dozens at most, to the large-scale harvesting carried out by the Collectors in ME2. It just doesn't add up. I conclude by summing up my argument: And there you have it. As you can see, no hypocrisy, no distorting or twisting of A's words (although I do admit that it appears I did overlook one point), and certianly nothing other than intelligent counter-argument (with a dash of my usual irreverence), but nothing along the lines of a 'hysterical backlash'. And with that, I'll close out this rather lengthy post. I did find this topic interesting, and do hope that the anonymous user who started this thread will return to discuss it further. We'll just have to wait and see if that happens, I suppose. SpartHawg948 22:45, June 5, 2010 (UTC) MischiefMaker Spart, yet another vandel. User:MischiefMaker. Lancer1289 21:22, June 5, 2010 (UTC) :And so aptly named too. --The Illusive Man 21:25, June 5, 2010 (UTC) ::Indeed. Lancer1289 21:26, June 5, 2010 (UTC) Article Validity Spart, for the life of me I can't figure out this new article, The Hidden Machine. I can't remember a reference anywhere in the books, comics, or the games. If I am wrong, then please correct me, but I can't remember anything. The article seems to be a spam article because it has so much speculation, I can't even figure out what is truth. Lancer1289 06:03, June 6, 2010 (UTC) :Also be sure to check out my battle of the week. I felt it was appropiate for the date. Lancer1289 06:10, June 6, 2010 (UTC) :I was guessing that the article is about the light inside that claw in the first game, but still, it has nothing to back it up. MEffect Fan 06:13, June 6, 2010 (UTC) ::I think that the user is just using it as a crutch to make the aritlce seem valid. But that's just me. Lancer1289 06:16, June 6, 2010 (UTC) ::Well, I don't know man, we are not admins so we cannot delete it. MEffect Fan 06:20, June 6, 2010 (UTC) Spart can you also check the Rogue VI page as well. This article falls under the heading of "can be covered elsewhere". There isn't enough justification to warrent its own article when it again can be covered elsewhere. Lancer1289 07:03, June 6, 2010 (UTC) 71.46.49.251 Second vandel today Spart. Please get rid of him. Thanks. He just vandalized MEffect Fan's user page so I thought I'd tell you about that. Lancer1289 06:22, June 6, 2010 (UTC) :It seems like MEffect Fan has become his favorite target now. Lancer1289 06:29, June 6, 2010 (UTC) Done. Sorry for the delay. I was writing another paper. On the bright side, no more papers to write this weekend. Oh, wait, I just remembered some more. Lame. :( SpartHawg948 07:30, June 6, 2010 (UTC) Recreation of a article Spart, User:FoxtrotZero just recreated the Kowloon Class redirect, to fix a broken link. This article was moved because of a misspelling and then you, or DRY, have to check the log, deleted it. Last time I checked, there are almost 200 broken links, and is it necessary to fix them all, as most are just one or two links? Can you please redelete the page. Also as it is 2:30am here, I really need to go to bed. I apologize if I over stepped my bounds here, or came across as a little accusitory. Lancer1289 07:29, June 6, 2010 (UTC) :Spart I don't know if you saw this last night, but I am curious about what to do with this situation. Lancer1289 17:41, June 6, 2010 (UTC) :I just noticed a problem with the link. It directed you to the wrong thing. I have corrected it. Also again I am wondering what to do in this situation. Lancer1289 19:45, June 6, 2010 (UTC) USAF Kill Protocal Spart, since I only have a cousin in the Navy, not a flight officer, and I am not 100% sure on this one, I need the official source. When it comes to tallying kills for pilots, it is the one who fires the final shot that gets the kill. I think that it can also go to the one who does the most damage, but this is why I am asking. Currenlty on the Talk:Mass Effect Guide page, there is a discussion about if the Normandy got the "kill" for Sovereign as its torpedo, or whatever it was, impacted Sovereign last, then wouldn't the Normandy get the kill. Again I could really use some input here, because I am not sure and as you are in the USAF, I figured you would know. Thanks in advance. Lancer1289 18:50, June 6, 2010 (UTC) :Yup. The one who takes the shot that downs the enemy gets the kill. This is usually backed up by reviewing gun camera footage. They don't even need to be 100% sure that the enemy plane went down. They can be awarded a 'probable' if it's reasonable to assume that the enemy craft didn't survive, but probables aren't awarded as much as they used to be, mostly due to advances in technology. Ditto for ground targets like tanks and fixed targets like bridges. SpartHawg948 20:38, June 6, 2010 (UTC) ::Thanks do you think you could comment on the talk page I linked above when you get some time. Also look at the video that was linked showing other shots. As I said these shots impacted before the Normandy's. So unless I am misunderstanding you, the Normandy would be awared the kill for Sovereign. Thanks in advance. Lancer1289 20:43, June 6, 2010 (UTC) I'll take a look once this damn irritating 'canon' situation is taken care of. SpartHawg948 20:45, June 6, 2010 (UTC) :Indeed can you also talk to User:FoxtrotZero about redirects and unnecessary articles. It seems that he is attempting to clear the wanted pages category, however the max is 5, being the BioWare article and creating redirects/deleting all the references for every link on that page, seems like overdoing it and completly unnecessary IMHO. Lancer1289 20:49, June 6, 2010 (UTC) Thanks for talking with him about that. I appoligize if I came across as combative or any variations on that that. Not having a good weekend. Lancer1289 21:04, June 6, 2010 (UTC) :No worries. SpartHawg948 21:55, June 6, 2010 (UTC) Fixing Broken Links? Hey mate. I made a redirect page for Kowlonn class last night (going to Kowloon Class). This was before you today enlightened me on asking people to fix links. Well I was going to leave the matter alone, but Lancer seems to be after me again, proposing the page for deletion. So i'm going to go ahead and tackle the root of the problem. If you could do me a favor and replace Kowlonn with Kowloon on this Talk Page and on your page 'Archive 3', it would be greatly appreciated. Thanks. --FoxtrotZero 21:08, June 6, 2010 (UTC) :No can do. It needs to be the person who actually wrote the comment. In this case, that would be Lancer1289. All I can do is delete the entire comment. Any changing of the actual comment itself has to be done by the author (unless the author is banned, which does not apply in this case). SpartHawg948 21:10, June 6, 2010 (UTC) ::Oh, dear, it would seem I wasn't paying attention. I saw it was on your page, so I assumed it was yours, which was poor form of me. I'll go ask Lancer about the matter, then. --FoxtrotZero 21:12, June 6, 2010 (UTC) Okay, this is getting out of hand. Regarding the matter with Tullis; If you would please visit User_talk:Lancer1289#Fixing_Broken_Links as you are one of only two who can help fix the issue. :Wow. Sorry that my trying to be helpful and keep you from running into dead ends (such as asking an admin who hasn't been active for 5 months and hasn't been responding to messages to take care of something) is "getting out of hand". I guess I'll just stop. I was just trying to help out. SpartHawg948 22:19, June 6, 2010 (UTC) ::Oh, you must have misunderstood me. By 'Getting out of hand' I was referring to the fact that, because I don't know exactly who to talk to for help here, i'm ending up going back and forth between talk pages. Hence, its a conversation across two or three talk pages that is getting out of hand, but its neither your fault nor mine that the system doesn't accomadate needs flawlessly. I should have known that, out of context, I came across quite rude. However, it is for this reason that I have created an easier way of getting the matters adressed that does not require mile long talk page sections, nor constantly bugging people. That can be viewed on my user page, if you have interest. And once more, I apologize for unintentionally insulting you. --FoxtrotZero 22:38, June 6, 2010 (UTC) Community Board A while back (about three to four months ago) I suggested the creation of a community board on DRY talk page. The only issue left to do was to work on the wording for the forum messages, that Lancer1289 gave me a hand with today (all thanks goes to him). I would appreciate if you could take a look at Template:CommunityBoardItem and Silverstrike/Sandbox/Forum:Projects‎‎ (sorry about the erroneous naming of the page) so we can kick-start the forum. Thanks --silverstrike 22:11, June 6, 2010 (UTC) :Just perused the links provided above, and both look pretty good. Was there anything in particular you wanted comment on? B/c if you just want my general opinion, I like what I'm seeing, and would have no issues with it being implemented. Hopefully it can help solve some of the issues we've been having here lately... SpartHawg948 22:23, June 6, 2010 (UTC) ::While I can't speak for Silverstike, I think your general opinion would be enough. I completely agree that this would help with some of the problems lately and it would be a better place to keep track of projects than you talk page. As we did with the DLC overhaul project. Lancer1289 22:36, June 6, 2010 (UTC) :::That's pretty much what I meant. I created the form index and added the link in the forum index page. Now all is left to do is create a topic :p --silverstrike 23:04, June 6, 2010 (UTC) Krogan Trivia Hey Spart, could use a fourth opinion here. After an overly long piece of trivia was added to the krogan article, I removed it on the point of that it was no relation. The person who added it is arguing his point on my talk page. Teugene agrees with me that the trivia doesn't relate to the krogan what so ever. So I could use a fourth opinion on the matter here. Lancer1289 00:29, June 7, 2010 (UTC) :Sorry for the edit confilct Spart. I was digging through Memory Alpha for the same link that you just provided, so I added it when I found it. Oops. Lancer1289 01:12, June 7, 2010 (UTC) No worries. Just another chapter in the endless saga of the edit conflict. SpartHawg948 01:13, June 7, 2010 (UTC) Weapon Damage formula for mass effect 2 i posted here the formula http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/944907-mass-effect-2/55117441 i've also sent an email to the bioware dev Christina Norman asking her to review it but that could take a while : ). i tested it out in game ...using a memory editor to see the enemy target Shield, Armor, Health values. The procedure for testing its a bit more complicated as the game uses some aditional multipliers to account for level scaling and dificulty level but thats the heart of it. it should help clear some innacuracies on the weapon comparison table. Peddroelm 11:05, June 9, 2010 (UTC) Race Name Caps Spart, IIRC, we only capitalize the names of Collectors, Protheans, and Reapers. I also seem to recall that we don't capitalize husk, scion, and abomination, or am I wrong about that? Lancer1289 14:49, June 10, 2010 (UTC) :Husk, Scion, Abomination are referring to specific units and are thus proper-noun, hence they should be capitalized. Teugene 17:32, June 10, 2010 (UTC) ::What I ment to say was that there are some articles that have Husk, Scion, and Abomination, in caps, there are others that have them all in lower case, and still others that have a mix of caps and lower case. I would just like some consistency here with this. Lancer1289 17:41, June 10, 2010 (UTC) :::Yes, that is true. Scions and Abominations are pretty clear cut and should be capitalized. Husks on the other hand are a little tricky. As Spart explained once to me before, if it's referring to the specific Husk unit(s), it should be capitalized. If it's referring to multiple husks in general (Husk, Scion and/or Abomination), then it is not capitalized. Just like for example, you have Blue Suns Commando and Eclipse Commando, if you're referring to all of them, you would say "commandos", not "Commandos". Confusing? I had been there before! Teugene 17:47, June 10, 2010 (UTC) :::P/S: Hmm, I thought there was a Blue Suns Commando, turns out there's only a Commander', so I was wrong on that. But you get my point anyway. Teugene 17:51, June 10, 2010 (UTC) ::::(edit conflict x3)Uh, my brain hurts from trying to figure that out, and from seeing that implemented. I think just a general rule with this one would be better becuase I can clearly see capitalizing Asari Commando, but husks that one is very tricky because you can't be sure what they are refering to, units or in general. Personally a general rule here would be good, but that is my opinion on the matter. Lancer1289 17:55, June 10, 2010 (UTC) :::::Yeah, it is difficult and it can be really tedious. I guess the best way is to carefully understand the context of the sentence and alter it correctly or change the sentence to be less ambiguous in its reference. Teugene 18:02, June 10, 2010 (UTC) Yeah, I forget who I spoke to about this before, but the long and short is, if it refers to the specific unit (which is generally the case with the walkthrough and class guide articles), they get capitalized (i.e. Husk), but if it refers to husks in general (as is the case with most references outside of the walkthroughs and class guides), no caps. SpartHawg948 19:25, June 10, 2010 (UTC) Reversion of good images and unnecessary information Hey Spart can you please drop User:Drell123 a message about some of our policies here. He uploaded an images, File:Thane Character Box.png, that was of poorer quailty than the current one. Dammej and then myself reverted back to the current and more higher resolution image. Then he reverted the File:Legion.png to a worse image and Darkman 4 got that back to the better, more colorful, and higher resolution image. He also uploaded an image, and then proceeded to insert it into the Shadow Broker article, which I am still trying to figure out if it is vandalism or not. He has also added some completly unfounded and unsourced information to the Biotics article. Also he has just modified another character box image. Can you please drop him a line becuase he just doesn't listen to anyone apparenlty. Lancer1289 18:51, June 10, 2010 (UTC) Overlord Release Date Um Spart, I think I am going in circles here. It was my impression that we only take the BioWare site as the official source for DLC release dates, or am I wrong here. I have been shutting it down all day, but JoePlay just added it to the news bar on the main page. Um, I am at a loss on this one, so I'd like your opinion on this. Lancer1289 23:58, June 10, 2010 (UTC) :No, I'd say that Major Nelson's XBox Live report would also be a legit source for information on DLC. SpartHawg948 00:49, June 11, 2010 (UTC) ::Alright then, I really just wanted an official position here. I make the necessary corrections. Lancer1289 00:50, June 11, 2010 (UTC) :Well, it's not like the "June" release date ever came from an "official" source either, right? It's always been "coming soon" on the DLC site. It's just a matter of trustworthyness of a source of information. As SpartHawg already mentioned, MajorNelson is a pretty trustworthy source. Dammej 00:54, June 11, 2010 (UTC)